


Reject

by sexy_lexi_and_kitten



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: (maybe) some gay sex, (maybe) suicide attempt, Adorable Michael, Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Ashton, Crying Michael, Eventual Smut, F/M, Insecurity, Self-Harm, michael is bullied, nerdy michael
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-04-04
Packaged: 2018-03-20 19:28:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3662187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sexy_lexi_and_kitten/pseuds/sexy_lexi_and_kitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"Okay, Lexi, it appears that the only open desk is next to…Mr. Clifford. Michael, raise your hand.” As the teacher walked out of the door, I saw a pale hand hesitantly rise into the air and went over to sit at the table with a boy with blond hair and a fringe that shames all of the other fringes I’ve ever seen. He avoided eye contact but moved his backpack out of the seat I was going to sit in before I tripped over something, dropping all of my stuff everywhere.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>I could hear laughter filling the room and felt tears pricking my eyes. I started to gather all of my stuff up. A pale hand then grabs the rest of my things and sets it on the desk before extending toward me...</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Boy With The Fringe

”Get up!” Was the first thing I heard, groaning as my blanket was pulled off of me. “Now! You will not miss your first day of school!” My aunt all but shouted, my head pounding with every word she said. Crap. I don’t want to go to school…

When she finally leaves my room, I hear the front door open and close, followed by the start of a car. Thank God she’s gone. Why does she hate me so much? I wondered while I got dressed. I slid on a pair of old dark wash skinny jeans that may or may not belong to my older cousin, but he won’t miss them. I throw on an old t-shirt I got from some concert I went to back in England and a pair of sneakers before leaving my room and heading to my bathroom to brush my teeth. I grabbed a black beanie and put it on over my short, asymmetrically cut bright red hair. And no. It’s not naturally red. It’s the kind of red you see on fire trucks. I grab my phone and backpack before shouting that I was leaving. As if anyone ACTUALLY cares…

After I finished what should have been a fifteen minute trek to my new school, having gotten lost, it ACTUALLY took me about twenty minutes, so I went to the front office to get my schedule.

“Hello, dear? How can I help you?” The lady behind the counter smiled at me, looking up from her computer screen.

“Um, well, I’m, uh, new here, and I don’t exactly know where I need to go…” I stammered, not liking the sudden stares from all the office clerks.

“Sure thing, sweetie. Just tell me your name and I’ll print out your schedule,” she said, her tone softening, somehow sensing my discomfort.

“Um, right, uh, Lexi Thomas,” I said, slightly more confident.

“Alright,” she printed out my schedule and a map, and told me how to get to my first class. “It’s already started, but don’t worry about interrupting. Your first teacher’s a good one.”

I walk into the room, conscious of the crowd of eyes staring right at me, my cheeks flushing despite my wishes.

“Ah, you must be Ms. Thomas. I was beginning to wonder if you’d ever show up,” the teacher smiled, “okay. Class, this is Lexi. She’s just moved here from England, from what the office ladies have said. Okay, Lexi, it appears that the only open desk is next to…Mr. Clifford. Michael, raise your hand.” As the teacher walked out of the door, I saw a pale hand hesitantly rise into the air and went over to sit at the table with a boy with blond hair and a fringe that shames all of the other fringes I’ve ever seen. He avoided eye contact but moved his backpack out of the seat I was going to sit in before I tripped over something, dropping all of my stuff everywhere.

I could hear laughter filling the room and felt tears pricking my eyes. I started to gather all of my stuff up. A pale hand then grabs the rest of my things and sets it on the desk before extending toward me, the pale blond boy looking at me, his eyes telling me that this is a common occurrence. I take his hand, feeling a warm, slightly fuzzy feeling in my stomach as I sit. As he goes back to his chair, it’s pulled out from under him just before he sits down, landing on his ass as even louder laughter erupted from the other students. He mutters a quiet “ow,” as his cheeks flushed with both anger and embarrassment. I reached out a hand to help him up as he did for me, and turned back to the boy who did this.

“What the hell is your problem? I don’t see why this is funny!” I all but shouted at him just as Mr. Flick walked back into the classroom with copies of a worksheet. 

“What’s not funny, Ms. Thomas?” He questioned, sensing my aggravation.

“Nothing, sir,” the boy behind me spoke up.

“No, it’s not nothing! You just pulled Michael’s chair out from underneath his for helping me up after your dickhead of a friend tripped me! That’s not fucking nothing!” I shouted, my anger finally taking over my brain.

“Hey, you watch your mouth, Thomas. Since it’s your first day, I’ll let you off with a warning. But you, Derek, get detention, because I didn’t miss you pull Michael’s chair out from underneath him,” he said, turning around and writing on the chalkboard to indicate that it wasn’t up for discussion.

Later that day…

I walked into the cafeteria and looked at my surroundings. It was a stereotypical high school cafeteria. As I looked, a boy I had befriended in my psychology class named Luke waved at me, gesturing for me to join him at his table. I walk over and sit across from Luke, setting my stuff down at my feet. “Hi!” He chirped.

“Hey,” I said, “who’s this?” I asked Luke, looking at the tanned boy sitting next to him.

“Oh, right. Lexi, this is Calum Hood. Calum, this is Lexi. She just moved here from England,” he said.

“Hey, Calum, you’ve got to hear this song, mate! It’s so great, it’s called “This Is Not a Song, It’s a Sandwich”, by-oh, um, h-hey,” I hear someone rush out as they walked up behind me. I turned around to see none other than Michael, the boy from my English class. I saw his cheeks redden slightly.

“By Psychostick. Yeah. I know that track. But you were wrong when you said he had to hear the song, because it’s not even a SONG,” I finished for him, leaving the other two to laugh at their friend’s embarrassment.

“Um, yeah. But, uh, Calum, you’d love it,” he coughed, sitting in the seat next to me awkwardly.

“Oh, Michael, this is L-,“ Luke started.

“I know. I sit next to her in English,” he muttered, obviously still embarrassed.

“Oh, cool then!” Luke smiled at us. We talked throughout lunch, Calum and Luke asking me questions about myself and where I was from while I asked them questions. Michael, however, stayed silent, until I asked him what kind of music he liked after hearing an answer from both Calum and Luke.

“Actually, I have to, um, go talk to Mr. Hensen about, um something. Bye, guys,” he stammered, his voice cracking slightly. Wow. Okay. He obviously didn’t like me.

“Well. That was odd,” Luke chuckled, clearly amused at Michael’s actions.

“He could be LESS obvious that he doesn’t like me,” I said, slightly hurt by his actions, seeing as I hadn’t done anything to him to make him not like me.

“No, Lexi, it’s not that. Michael’s a very shy guy. He probably wasn’t going to talk to you at first. That’s normal. But he NEVER talks to teachers outside of class. He doesn’t really give two shits about school,” Calum explained, somehow sensing that my feelings had been hurt.

“Well, it appears that we DO have something in common,” I mused, gathering my stuff and looking at my schedule. Chemistry. God, I hope this teacher is a good one. Because if not, then it looks like I’ll be teaching the fucking class. AGAIN. That’s why I generally get bad grades. So that teacher’s that don’t know what the hell they’re talking about don’t ask me to explain.


	2. Chemistry Is A Bitch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I REALLY hate chemistry..._

As I enter the classroom, I set my stuff down on the table in the back, wondering if I’ll have to deal with some idiot sitting next to me all year. Just as I was about to sit, some chick shouted, “I wouldn’t sit in that seat if I were you!”

“Why not?” I asked her, internally rolling my eyes.

“Because then you’d have to sit next to Michael Clifford,” she said, her face screwing up as if she’d just eaten a lemon raw. She pointed up at the seating chart I hadn’t noticed. My name wasn’t on it, but I didn’t expect it to be. Looking at the chart, Michael Clifford was indeed supposed to sit here, but he didn’t have anyone assigned to sit in the seat next to him.

“Yeah? What’s so bad about him?” I asked, curious to hear her response.

“He’s a freak! Sitting next to him would be social suicide, and being from another country, people will think your totes cool. UNLESS you sit with losers like him!” She said as if it should’ve been obvious to me.

“Oh, well. Looks like all the other good seats are taken,” I said, noticing the empty seat next to her.

“No, this one’s open! You can sit with me! We can be totes besties!” She chirped.

“No, as I said, all the GOOD seats are already taken,” I smirked, hearing her gasped and hold her hand to her chest, offended.

As I was busy talking to her, I failed to notice that somehow, Michael had managed to slip into the classroom unnoticed. I saw that his eyes were slightly glossy, probably from the harsh words that bitch said about him while he probably just sat and listened. That pissed me off. I sat down and turned to him.

“Well, it looks like we’re partners in two classes now,” I mused, giving him a half-smile, shocked when he actually returned the gesture. As he opened his mouth to respond, the teacher came in and told everyone to stop talking. 

“Hello, class. I’m your chemistry teacher Mrs. Mackey. First things first, I will need to take roll.” She said, looking at her seating chart and calling names from there. When she finally got to Michael, she looked up to familiarize herself with the faces. “Oh, look at that. Another student. What’s your name?”

“Lexi Thomas,” I said, pushing past my nerves and hearing my voice ring out, sounding much more confident than I felt.

“Well, Ms. Lexi, why don’t you move up here next to Cassie. It’s much closer, and I can personally say that she’s a very nice girl,” she said turning around and beginning to write on the whiteboard after pointing to the girl who had been talking to me earlier.

“With all due respect, Mrs. Mackey, I think that I’d rather stay here and sit with Michael,” I responded, trying not to sound TOO rude. Yet.

“I think you’ll enjoy sitting next to Cassie more. She will probably make a much better partner for you,” she said very insensitively, looking at Michael, obviously judging his long fringe and darker clothing. I didn’t miss the quiet sigh that escaped Michael as he ducked his head even lower than it had been already, closing his eyes. I saw his feature twist into a frown, and I felt the anger rise in me.

“Well, Mrs. Mackey, I think that you are dead wrong. You would have no way of knowing who would be a better partner for me because you don’t know me. Just because you have a degree in psychology doesn’t mean that you automatically know everything about everyone’s brains. It just so happens that I sit next to Michael in another class, and he is quite a great partner,” I said, letting my anger take over slightly.

“Alright, fine,” she sighed. My face was hot with the anger I felt at the fact that a teacher who had to be in her sixties was just as bad as her students when it came to judging people.

As she lectured about a bunch of shit I already knew, I took this time to discreetly take in Michael’s appearance. He was wearing a t-shirt that I couldn’t quite see since he was leaned over his notebook frantically writing something. His skin was very pale, his hair a dirty blond. He had on black skinny jeans, that looked REALLY tight, but who am I to judge? His face was smooth and quite handsome. He had big blue-green eyes. They were probably the prettiest eyes I’d ever seen. His cheeks were slightly chubby, which when paired with his big green eyes, gave him an almost childlike innocence. He was quite attractive, and before I knew it, the bell rang, signaling the end of the class, everyone shooting out of their seats. Michael looked up, and as he did, caught me staring at him. This time, my cheeks flushed red.

“What’s your next class?” He asked me softly, making eye contact.

“Um, it says Mr. Day. Music,” I muttered, looking down at my schedule. “It just says ‘music room.’” I hadn’t the faintest idea of where that would be.

“Oh, cool. That’s my next class. I could show you how to get there. I-I mean, if you, like, want me to…” his voice trailed off at the end.

“Sure. I would like that, Michael,” I smiled at his kind gesture and felt a blush creep its way onto my cheeks when he returned mine with a shy smile of his own. Could I really have a crush on this guy already?

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is the first thing I've posted here. You can also find this on my tumblr (hello-iwantmichaelclifford.tumblr.com)


End file.
